An Interview with my Third Cousin: (The Legendary) Ed Asner.
I was rummaging through my closet this morning looking for socks and a jacket, but instead I found an old Magic The Gathering deck and a dusty book of scraggly notes. I realized these jumbled notations were actually from early 2006: a compilation for my AP English interview project. Although this project never came to fruition, I did have a finished project to publish...so why not here and now on steemit?
For this 'thesis', I had decided to interview one of the more prolific members of my family, and although me and Ed had only met twice when I was very small...he embraced me as a son and was more than happy to help me out. Edward Asner is my third cousin on my grandfather Michael's side, the age gap is massive but who cares...we're blood. It isn't easy to get an interview with this elusive gentlemen, but he opened up knowing I would benefit; I will forever love the guy to an utmost extent, Edward is a true philanthropist.
There are many layers to this wonderfully talented guy, he is a multiple time Emmy and Tony award winner for his time on television and Broadway. He is most known for his film roles in 'JFK' and 'The Roots'; Ed acted for over a decade on 'The Mary Tyler-Moore' show and it's spin off 'Lou Grant' (in which he was the cast's leading star.) My cousin was always inspired by Spencer Tracy and Fredrick March (in the show business sense), he had always desperately wanted to be an actor since youth. In school Asner always participated in plays like 'Junior-Miss' and other small productions, he sought to perform on any stage. His high school actually allowed him to host a radio show after class: "I took great pride in being able to pretend with my voice, I thought I was much too ugly to be an actor, visually, but with my voice I could be anything in the world. I could be the King, I could be the Devil, I could be anybody."
In college Ed was able to perform in more large scale productions, he told me the highlight of his university tenure came when playing the Duke of York in Shakespeare's 'Richard the Second'. The stage gave him confidence, and as a young man of the house...he needed the esteem. Ed's brothers were drafted to World War II when he was in school, and it was a hardship that lay a lot of pressure upon the family. At just twenty two he graduated from the University of Chicago, and he was drafted into the Korean War shortly thereafter. He was assigned to the Signal Corp and underwent basic training in Camp Gordon, Georgia (now called Fort Gordon). He was then sent to New Jersey for specialized Corp training; Ed was very good at general physics but had no idea of how radar worked. "The mass majority of us didn't know a damn thing! We couldn't learn a damn thing because it occurred to us... that it was being shoved at us too fast, and it was too difficult to absorb, and it's enormously complicated." Ed admits he somewhat cheated his way through the learning phase, and still became a radar repairman within a month. He was sent overseas to a small post in south central France which actually had no need for a radar specialist. He ended up becoming a typist whom wrote up and posted training schedules, this was a weekly task for a post of around 180 men. "Surely nothing to do, and very boring except for the fact that we were in France."
EA was always an athletic type of guy, and he is a still a huge basketball fan. In fact he was the first man to start a sports team among his squadron in France. He acted as the team's coach and manager until his discharge only a few months later, but his influence led the team to represent America as they placed second overall in the military's Euroleague! "...the French hated us at the time, they were very opposed to us being in France. This is 1953, and the Korean War was on...and we did a lot to improve Franco-American relations.I didn't repair any radar machines, sets, but I did make people think more nicely of my country."
Ed Asner made his early run from movies to cinema in the span of a few decades, he is one of the few actors to work with Elvis Presley twice (on films Kid Gallahad and Change of Habit). He found himself travelling the world at a young age, and as an actor he was able to meet world leaders in some instances. He had come across India's prime minister Nayru from whom he wanted and received an autograph. He's met King Heussin of Jordan (who was very hospitable apparently), Gorbachev, Prince Phillip, Fidel Castro, and Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua just to name a few. "They left a nice impression, just not a royal one. They didn't pick their nose, they were nice, warm, cordial, receptive."
If you were watching television in the 70s and 80s, Ed Asner was undoubtedly a big part of your watching routine. He had an amazing run on arguably the greatest show ever made for seven years: The Mary Tyler-Moore Show. His performances as the lovably stern boozer Lou Grant led to high ratings and an impeccable five year run...but the station cancelled the show due to 'funding' problems. Ed had a feeling the cancellation was more so due to his opposing of US policies at the time: one representation being his donation of $25,000 to El Salvador (for medical aid).
He was nominated as SAG (Screen Actors Guild) president in 1981, and spent the next four years pushing to merge SAG with the SEG (Screen Extras Guild) using the ERA (Equal Rights Amendment). His proposition was eventually passed and led to many of the positive outcomes (in terms of pay and work time) for union and non union actors everywhere. Asner had such an influence on the Guild as president, that he was awarded the Ralph Morgan Award in 2000 and the SAG Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002. "I believe in unionism...I believe when we find ourselves blessed with good fortune, we must answer to a higher standard of caring. We pass this way once, and how we behave along the way is who we turn out to have been all along."
A highlight of Ed's cinematic career came with Oliver Stone's noir-style masterpiece JFK. He played the low life detective Guy Bannister along side his partner Jack Martin (played by the incredible Jack Lemmon); these two anti communist drunkards added divisive humor and tense emotion to every scene they were in. Ed says this was by far the most gripping piece of film he has acted in to date, Ed was a young man who remembers the morning of November 22nd, 1963 vividly. He was acting on a show called Slattery's People that fateful day. Ed was on a mock assembly floor ready for production when the set received word over teletype: John Fitzgerald Kennedy had been assassinated. "Of course I was devastated like everybody else was. We didn't know what to do with ourselves." Asner recalled a young man and woman from the Sergeant of Arms office whom offered him and his co-stars a ride around Sacramento. "They stopped by the Russian River, and an old reserve town called Nevada City." He remembered this day thoroughly through the haze of emotion; the beauty of primitive California made him feel alive.
Ed admitted to me that his proudest moments were far from the cameras...he felt no greater joy than having twins with his wife, and thirteen years later being able to watch his boy Matthew get Bar Mitzvah'd (A Jewish celebration in which a boy turns into a 'man'). Matthew does live with autism, and at the time of our interview Matthew was only seventeen. I haven't seen Ed in years, but I have read of him and his son's work with autism foundations and it is nothing less than awe inspiring.
"How will you be remembered Ed, how do you want to be remembered?"
"...as a square shooter, and a good actor. Also as somebody who tried to fight for what they believed in... You gotta do what you gotta do. I certainly was discouraged by other people, so why should I discourage the next generation? Don't forget humor though. It's probably the most cardinal point unlearned. When I used to do drama I used to do it very stiff jaw, very grave heart..until I became somewhat proficient at comedy. And when I realized that no matter what you do, the greatest tragedy has to and will always have laughs in it. And it's for you to discover that it punctuates tragedy, just as tragedy can punctuate comedy; Chaplin was a good example. It is probably the most important thing to shoot for. It's finding those little, highlighting moments of comedy to set-off the tragedy, or the drama. It makes it juicier. Just, keep it in mind."
Amazing post my friend, I wish i could give you more rewards, I hope some power houses see this post it deserves a huge thump:).
ty as always my friend.
@thecryptodrive powerhouse has voted!! Drat... only 8 cents given :(
Haha! Ty crypto. Means a lot to just have you read it.